Unrelated to your problem...

Consider replacing 

      opendir(DIR,$dir_to_open) || die("Cannot open directory !\n");
        @dir_contents= readdir(DIR);
      closedir(DIR);

      foreach $file (@dir_contents){
        if(!(($file eq ".") || ($file eq ".."))){
             # I want to delete the files 
         }

[download]

with: 

use File::Slurp;
for my $file (grep { -f } read_dir($dir_to_open)) {
      # I want to delete the files 
}

[download]

File::Slurp is a CPAN module which abstracts away all the open/close/checking details and automatically filters out the special 'dot' directories. The grep -f selects only files.

You do use strict and warnings, don't you?

In reply to Re: Delete files if they match help! by toolic
in thread Delete files if they match help! by Anonymous Monk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.